Self Portrait as Love Letter

Mid-June. The morning is cross-

threaded, sunlight heartbreaking.

In the kitchen I am looking for you

within Korean ice cream bars:

heard it's over 110 degrees in Vegas

& over 100 here in California.

Turns out ice cream is best before

breakfast; turns out I can only write

in the kitchen; turns out every poem

I write misses you somehow.

Wait. This is a self portrait.

There shouldn’t be any space

for you here, but you’re an invasive species

& you might not even know it;

I don’t blame you. When I write

about myself it feels like I’m writing letters

to you: the poem solidifies into a glass

mirror & you appear in it.

I can’t tell the difference between

us anymore—everything blurs—

I’d say you complete me but we’re both

not too fond of cliches, like the way

we both scrunch our noses in disgust

when we call each other baby.

How we draw hearts with our feet

& by the way there’s no one else

I’d ever show my ugly toes to, or

the way we sleep like dead men made

obsidian in Pompeii, belly down

on Earth but still intimate.

I don’t want to look up definitions

or synonyms for this thing between us—

I don’t know what to call it

& I don’t want to. Just promise me

you won’t let me enter the unknown

until you’re all I know, won't let me love

you until you’re here—almost

have you next to me & here’s why

the sun's heartbreaking: it means another

day of waiting, an emptiness I never

knew: holes carved out of my abdomen

& I don’t know what to fill them with.

It’s hot, but I open the windows anyway.

I imagine this heat is yours & then

it starts to feel warm, full; I lean in.

Come. Join me. It tastes like the cusp of summer.